Chapter 13
Thirteen
On the way to North Harbor Monday morning with Maddie behind him on the bike, Mac relived the best weekend of his life.
After church on Sunday, he’d unearthed an infant life jacket from his father’s garage and took Thomas and Maddie on a ride around the Salt Pond in his father’s vintage Chris-Craft. Thomas had loved being on the water.
They’d met his parents for a drink at the Tiki Bar afterward, during which his mother seemed to make an attempt to be friendly to Maddie but gave Mac the cold shoulder.
He figured she’d come around in time and decided not to waste any time worrying about it.
Linda even took a turn holding Thomas, who reduced Big Mac to mush with his sweet disposition.
For the most part, it had been a successful visit, and Mac was more hopeful about taking a harmonious step into matrimony.
Married.
God, a couple of weeks ago the word would’ve given him hives.
Now here he was with the woman he loved on the back of his bike and a baby he wanted to do everything for.
Amazing what a difference the right woman made.
Pulling up to the hotel, Mac parked and cut the engine.
He helped her off the bike and removed the helmet.
“I want you to take it easy today. That elbow still looks bad. Don’t bang it on anything.”
“I won’t, don’t worry.”
“I’ll be right down the hill.” He pointed to the marina. “You can look out the window and see me on the roof.”
She reached up to caress his face. “Be careful up there. I’ve become quite fond of this body, and I want it all in one piece.” Her hand moved from his face to his chest and began to slide south.
He stopped her at his belly. “Don’t start anything,” he growled. “I already hate that I have to let you go for six whole hours.”
“You’re pouting again.”
“Come see me at lunchtime?”
“If I can get away.”
Mac gave her a lingering kiss. “Try hard.”
She clung to him. “Gotta go,” she whispered.
“Okay.”
Except neither of them let go.
He kissed her forehead and then her lips. “Go. I’ll pick you up at quarter to three.”
“You won’t be done working by then. I can get a ride home.”
“I’ll be here, and don’t you dare let me see you on the back of anyone else’s motorcycle.”
Maddie giggled. “No worries.” She slung her tote bag over her shoulder and gave him a sultry look. “Yours is the only motor I want between my legs.”
Mac groaned at the suggestive comment and rested against the bike to watch her fine rear end stretch against tight denim shorts as she walked up the hill. He whistled softly.
“Cut it out,” she said over her shoulder, but he saw her smile.
“Madeline.”
She had reached the top of the hill but turned back, feigning exasperation. “What?”
“You forgot something.”
“I did?”
He raised an eyebrow.
Her face flushed with color. “Love you.”
Smiling, he said, “Now I can go to work.” He slung his left leg over the bike, fired it up and turned toward the marina, feeling her eyes on him all the way down the hill.
At a picnic table outside the marina restaurant, Mac found his father entertaining a baby from one of the boats while holding court with Ned and several other locals. Each of them had a tall cup of coffee, and they were sharing a platter of sugar doughnuts.
“Hey!” Big Mac shouted. “There he is! The man who’s going to keep this place from falling down around me.”
“Formidable task,” Ned muttered.
“You said it,” Mac replied. “Any of my guys here yet?”
“Haven’t seen ’em,” Big Mac said. He nudged his old friend, Sam Pressley, the retired Gansett police chief, to make room for Mac.
“Let me get some coffee,” Mac said. He returned a few minutes later and joined the men at the table.
Ned reached for another doughnut.
“You’re going to eat your way to diabetes,” Big Mac said to his friend as he kissed the baby and handed her back to her mother.
Ned licked the sugar off his fingers. “Helluva way to get there.” He wiped his face on his sleeve and turned to Mac. “I hear you’re all shacked up with that gal from the hotel.”
“Jeez,” Mac said. “Cut right to the chase, why don’t ya?”
“What gives?” Ned said.
Big Mac snickered but didn’t bail out his son.
The others leaned in, waiting for the scoop.
“Let’s see: I love her, we’re getting married, I’m staying here, probably going to take over this dump and see if I can save it from bankruptcy, I bought a new truck, I’m looking for some property to build a house on and, oh yeah, I’m going to adopt her son. Good enough?”
The other men, including his father, stared at him, mouths hanging open.
“All that in a week?” Ned finally said.
“Yep.” Mac drank his coffee and enjoyed a doughnut while the others processed the news.
“If you want property,” Sam said, “you’ve come to the right place.”
“How’s that?” Mac asked.
“Talk to Ned. He can fix you up.”
Mac glanced at Ned, who squirmed in his seat.
Big Mac let out a lusty laugh. “Looks like you’re about to be thrust outta the closet, old buddy.”
Mac had no idea what they were talking about.
“Ned owns half this island, boy,” Cliff Sutter said. “You want property for less than a mil, you go to him.”
“I might even cut you a deal,” Ned said gruffly.
Mac stared at him. “You drive a cab and dress like a hobo, and you own half this island?”
Big Mac and the others howled with laughter.
“What the hell’s wrong with the way I dress?” Ned huffed. “And I’ll have ya know that I drive a cab because I like to. Owning property doesn’t keep me all that busy, and sitting around the house watching soaps ain’t exactly my style.”
“I’ll be damned,” Mac said. “You think you know a guy. . .”
As the construction workers Mac had hired arrived, they were welcomed into the circle.
Mac hoped this would become his new routine as he settled into working at McCarthy’s: waking up with Maddie, taking a walk with Thomas and then coffee with his dad and the boys before beginning work for the day.
That he could find such contentment and sense of purpose on an island that had once made him feel so confined still amazed him.
Now he just had to find a way to tell his partners in Miami that he wasn’t coming back.
Maddie was greeted with hugs from coworkers full of questions about Mac. She filled them in as quickly as she could before Ethel started spewing orders at them.
“Mac is sooooo cute,” Daisy whispered to Maddie.
“I never get tired of looking at him.”
“And that he filled in here for you like that. . .” Daisy rested a hand on her chest and seemed to swoon a bit.
“He wants to marry me and adopt Thomas,” Maddie whispered, dying to tell someone who’d be happy for her. Tiffany didn’t qualify.
“Oh my God,” Daisy squealed.
“Ladies, are you listening to me?” Ethel barked.
“Yes, ma’am,” they said together, choking back giggles.
When Ethel went back to giving orders, Maddie told Daisy about the job offer at the Beachcomber. “I’d want to take you with me.”
“You mean it?”
“Of course I do.”
“Oh, Maddie, I’m so happy for you. No one deserves all this more than you do.”
Maddie squeezed her friend’s arm. “Thanks.”
Later that morning, as his workers began removing the existing roof on the main building, Mac crawled around in the eaves and made an interesting discovery.
Much of the building’s frame had been recently replaced.
“What the heck?” he muttered. “Why wouldn’t Dad have mentioned that?
” It definitely made his job easier but presented a baffling mystery.
Who would take the time and considerable effort—not to mention the expense—to prop up the sagging building?
Certainly not Big Mac, who seemed to do nothing more than land boats, play with kids and pass the bull with his buddies these days.
Mac took a closer look at the quality craftsmanship, which had probably kept the building from falling down around them. “Very interesting.”
Climbing down the ladder from the attic, he couldn’t figure out who could’ve done the work.
Out of curiosity, he ducked into his father’s office, which was located upstairs from the restaurant.
On the desk were disorderly piles of paper, an open check register, discarded paper cups and general chaos.
Mac groaned.
“It’s quite a mess,” a voice behind him said.
Mac turned. “Luke. I didn’t hear you come in.”
Luke focused on the desk. “I can’t remember the last time I saw him in here.”
“That so?”
“He loves being out on the docks, hanging with people, coming up with new ideas to grow the business. It’s this part he tends to forget about.”
Mac heard the affection for his father in Luke’s voice. “The bills getting paid?”
“Doubt it.”
Right in that moment, Mac got it. It made perfect sense. Everyone loved Big Mac. Why not the quiet young man who’d worked for him for twenty summers? “You’ve been making repairs, haven’t you? That’s what you’re spending the money on.”
“What money?”
“The money I’ve seen you pocketing.”
“And of course you thought I was stealing from him,” Luke said, sounding bitter.
“I saw the new beams and couldn’t figure out who would’ve done that. Since he never mentioned it, I figured he didn’t know.”
“The place is a wreck, and I’d tell him, ‘Mac, we need to make some repairs around here.’ He’d say, ‘Oh, come on, Luke. We can get one more year out of it, can’t we?’ We’ve had that same conversation every May for four years.”
Mac smiled. “I can picture it.”
“Because all he wants to do is hang out with his buddies, I started working nights to prop up the roof before it collapsed and killed someone. I was relieved to hear he was finally going to let you replace it. One more good blow and we would’ve been screwed.”
“You did a really good job.”
“Thanks. Let me know what I can do to help with the rest of it.”
“I appreciate that.” After Luke went back to work, Mac stared at the mess on the desk, wondering how he’d manage to get the repairs done and reorganize the business at the same time. “Looks like I got here just in time.”